Traditional Paladin

Ian_Stormbringer

So, I understand that the Templar is the route, but I want to play this world as a traditional Paladin. Which means, in my mind, S/B, Heavy, Heal. Is this possible if I don't want to be a Elite player. I love to grind and pick up everything. I do play solo alot do to my gaming hours. I have read many sites but none really explain the traditional Paly. What skill and attributes should I follow. Any suggestions from vets would be helpful. I am L25 at the moment but do not know the path to choose. May the Eagles show you the path.

doslekis

If you're just grinding in PvP throw on a sword and board with heavy armor and jab everything to death. If you ever get into pvp look up heavy armor templar builds.

Don't think it's great for dungeons but if u just want to have fun go for it.

Ian_Stormbringer

What about grouping and a guild if I choose? I am not into PVP yet but I would like to get involved.

dpencil1

Templar is definitely the Paladin archetype. Smite your enemies with holy light. Doesn't get much more Paladiny than that. Just spend some time looking through your skill trees and pick stuff that looks appealing. It doesn't have to be any more complicated than that. There are guilds you can join who will have people willing to team up with you in overland leveling content. But the majority of group content takes place at end-game with dungeons, trials, and PvP.

HatchetHaro

Templars can make for good tanks.

To be honest, any class can make for good tanks as long as you got a S&B and a taunt.

Cazic

Sounds like you're on the right track. Go Templar,. Heavy armor and sword and board. For you back bar, go either 2h or resto staff depending on if you want extra damage or extra healing. The fighters guild skill line would compliment a paladin class well, too.

Given the way you've described your playstyle I would just try different skilld from those skill lines and find what works best for you.

For attritubtes... I see a traditional pally being more health focused with some magicka to help with healing. But you could also go the other way for more healing and more spell damage. It depends on who you want your pally to be.

max_only

A sword and shield Templar is sometimes called a stamplar. <---- Edit to point out that it says Sometimes in that sentence. Some sword and shield templars are stamina based, some are not. Some tanks are stamina based, some are not. That's why the word Sometimes was included in that sentence. Geesh.
This is because the game currently rewards stacking one attribute as opposed to spreading out your attributes evenly. (Hybrid builds are coming into ascendancy now though). Since sword and shield is a stamina skill line, it makes sense that the rest of your character should be stamina too. There are skill morphs in the Templar skill lines that allow you to use stamina to cast instead of magicka. As you level you always want to be wearing at least 1 of each weight armor (heavy, medium, light) because you'll then be prepared to switch around combinations and passives in the future.

More important than the archetype is the role (tank, healer, dps) you will want to play when you start doing dungeons. A tank that can heal is nice, but it's more important that you survive. A healer than can survive is nice but it's more important that you can heal. This is why you will hear people groan about a healer or a dps with 25k + health -- it's a waste and the points could have been spent making spells/damage/healing stronger. Paladins can do both in other games but in this one, your group will thank you to be choose one role to be stellar at, and will forgive if you can barely do the other two roles. For example, my tank is a magnb in 5pc heavy armor. His spells are weak, they don't do a lot of damage, but all his damage spells also heal the group. I've built him to take a lot of damage and to survive/sustain (recover resources for long fights) in case of a non traditional healer (a healer that doesn't restore resources to the group via orbs or shards). Dungeon groups expect me to survive, healing them is nice and all but unnecessary. My healer is a Templar in 5pc light armor. He's not built to survive damage, he's built to outheal damage and support/buff. His spells are powerful but he could never take the direct damage. Fully buffed with food, in a team with an Ebon armor tank and active warhorn I don't think he goes past 20k health. And that's because I've focused on his role.

So figure out if your "paladin" is more of a tank or healer and make your choices from there. Can one do both? Yes, especially while soloing you're going to want to be able to dps, heal and take hits. When grouping though: Your team will thank you to just do one role and do it well.

Sneaky-Snurr

Going on the hybrid path is not a bad idea by the way. I run a complete hybrid build for my Templar (stam-magicka build; DD, healer and tank) and it works like a charm in PvP and PvE.

Mind you it excels in most situations but it comes in short when we're talking of one extreme to another extreme.
As a consequence, I neither push out top-of-the-line DPS nor do I have tower-like defence as a tank but I can outdo and/or survive from most tanks and DDs in long fights which I think is on-par as an all-rounder build in PvP.
As for PvE, I can tank Vet dungeons easily while also pushing out good damage but it only stops there as I could not tank and dish out damage in Trials as effectively as I could in Vet dungeons so in that instance, I change roles as a DD and my DPS is ample enough.

That said, I think you should try a hybrid build as it is versatile in a lot of situations.

Tannus15

This is completely doable and a lot of fun.

Go for knight errant gear from Blackheart Haven (I mean, c'mon, you have to!).
Combine that with Akaviri Dragonguard armour and build around puncture, heroic slash and power of the light with jabs thrown in for fast ultimate generation and cheap crescent sweep spam.

All attributes in stamina since you'll be doing fine for health with heavy armour passives + jewellery.

Do whatever you like on the back bar since you don't need to keep the 5pc knight errant (unless you're running sword and board on both bars)

The biggest problem with this build is that if you're trying to DPS you can't use puncture in a group since you'll screw up the boss taunt, but you can pretty much just jab instead of puncture and you're fine.

hmsdragonfly

Ian_Stormbringer wrote: »

So, I understand that the Templar is the route, but I want to play this world as a traditional Paladin. Which means, in my mind, S/B, Heavy, Heal. Is this possible if I don't want to be a Elite player. I love to grind and pick up everything. I do play solo alot do to my gaming hours. I have read many sites but none really explain the traditional Paly. What skill and attributes should I follow. Any suggestions from vets would be helpful. I am L25 at the moment but do not know the path to choose. May the Eagles show you the path.

It's actually super strong in PvP. Magicka Templar, Heavy, S&B, Breath of Life. Basic setup: 5 pieces Kagrenac, Transmutation Jewelry (1 Reduce cost, 2 Spell Damage), Transmutation S/B Back bar, Will Power S/B Front bar, Skoria/Engine Guardian as Monster Helm.

hmsdragonfly

max_only wrote: »

A sword and shield Templar is sometimes called a stamplar.

Not true. Sword and Board Magplars are very strong in PvP. You use class skills and guild skills instead of sword and board skills.

hmsdragonfly

Sneaky-Snurr wrote: »

Going on the hybrid path is not a bad idea by the way. I run a complete hybrid build for my Templar (stam-magicka build; DD, healer and tank) and it works like a charm in PvP and PvE.

Mind you it excels in most situations but it comes in short when we're talking of one extreme to another extreme.
As a consequence, I neither push out top-of-the-line DPS nor do I have tower-like defence as a tank but I can outdo and/or survive from most tanks and DDs in long fights which I think is on-par as an all-rounder build in PvP.
As for PvE, I can tank Vet dungeons easily while also pushing out good damage but it only stops there as I could not tank and dish out damage in Trials as effectively as I could in Vet dungeons so in that instance, I change roles as a DD and my DPS is ample enough.

That said, I think you should try a hybrid build as it is versatile in a lot of situations.

He doesn't have to go hybrid route. He can go either stamina or magicka route.

Tyrobag

Sword and shield and heavy armor is tanking gear, and not suitable for healing. If you want to do something like this solo, thats nobody's business and is up to you. But you cant do group play with a build like that. If you want to use sword and shield and heavy armor (and be a productive member of PvE), I'd recommend being a tank.

TheShadowScout

Ian_Stormbringer wrote: »

So, I understand that the Templar is the route, but I want to play this world as a traditional Paladin. Which means, in my mind, S/B, Heavy, Heal. Is this possible...

Yes.
A hybrid templar build, with main focus on health for sustainability and stamina for the damage, but maybe a little magica to feed the heals and holy attacks, heavy armor, S&B and a two-hander for backup. It works pretty well, in a "slow and steady" kind of approach. You won't make great DPS, but you will have neat survivability, and grind down all but the toughest opponents... with a bit of offtank and offheals for group support as well.

PvP lives from the gear proc assisted speedgank more often then not, so that kind of non-ganky build will be a bit second rate at it, but still quite a pain for your opponents to take down between armor and heals.

And don't forget to play the rest of it too... keep away from these dens of scum and villanry that are outlaw refugees, pass by those thieves troves and burglary opportunities, if you steal something by accident, immideatly report your crime to the nearest guard and pay the fine, choose only the "goody two greaves" options on quest choices, and grind your teeth when you visit Abah's landing to collect the skyshards and find you get a mandatory thieves guild membership at the city gates for some reason (I hate that, and wish I could join the Iron Wheel instead with my "lawful" characters... I'd pay a crown mstore service to get rid of that unwanted TG membership...)

DeHei

Traditional paladin?

Process initiated:

Wear heavy armor
Spam honor the dead

Process finished

Biro123

Kind of depends what your view of a 'traditional paladin' is.

For me, I'd view a Magplar more like the traditional Cleric - and the Stamplar as the traditional Paladin.

BUT - to get one of them main heals your Stamplar would need to feel like a paladin (Vigour) - you'll need to PVP with him to unlock it.

Although you could go the mag route as others have said and focus on heavy armour/snb and use abilities that fit the theme better (jabs/javelin/heals/purges) - but it wouldn't really be optimal for group PVE (but again would probably be fine for PVP)

Hehe - I guess its just one of the differences between PVP/PVE builds... I view the traditional Paladin as being a melee fighter with heavy armour and a few religion-based supporting spells/abilities. Basically, someone who can do some damage, is quite durable, who can heal a bit and buff/cleanse, perhaps with a bit of CC.. Kind of an all-rounder - which is exactly what a PVP (or solo PVE) build needs to be.
Group PVE roles tend to focus on being the best at one thing at the expense of all others.

Rickter

my guild's main healer would probably fit this mold for pvp.

she wears 5 heavy, heals like a mack truck, has 3900 spell dmg, and 2000 regen.

DKsUnite

Tyrobag wrote: »

Sword and shield and heavy armor is tanking gear, and not suitable for healing. If you want to do something like this solo, thats nobody's business and is up to you. But you cant do group play with a build like that. If you want to use sword and shield and heavy armor (and be a productive member of PvE), I'd recommend being a tank.

Well this is false.

If you plan to do trials you need to be more "meta" but for everything else a heavy snb templar who is a healer and a tank is viable. I personally run daily dungeons on my templar. I run with 3 dps to make the dungeons go faster while I tank and heal.

Currently I run 2 Engine guardian, 5 kags and then the other 5 piece is up to you (alteration mastery is nice for this type of build).

The tougher dungeons might require you to alter your build to cater to pure tanking or pure healing but you can cross that bridge when you come to it since you are still a low level

Narvuntien

I suggest templar tank.
It is hybrid as in it a tank with lots of mag regen allowing you spam that breath of life. You are primary tank with self and back up heals.
You have basicaly no damage so soloing anything takes forever but you'll be able to tank even vet dungeons fine.

I use a Breton. Akaviri dragongaurd, spectres eye, and shadowrend.

Drachenfier

I play my templar like that...s/b, 5 heavy, 1 light 1 medium. full magicka. I despise jabs with every fiber of my being, but unfortunately there's no getting around that skill.

Cage_Lizardman

If you want to be a paladin Elder Scrolls style, read the Song of Pelinal. The important part is being covered in the blood of elves.

Vol II
" [and Pelinal] came to Perrif's camp of rebels holding a sword and mace, both encrusted with the smashed viscera of elven faces"

Dual wielding might be more appropriate.

DocFrost72

5 pieces crafted seducers armor (heavy) 5 pieces of either withered hand (the slaying of the wicked sustains you) or spell power cure (your blessings turn routed allies into fierce warriors once more), with any cool monster set you like/crafted head and shoulder until you get them.

You'll have tons of armor, a sword and shield, tanking AND healing utility!

max_only

hmsdragonfly wrote: »

max_only wrote: »

A sword and shield Templar is sometimes called a stamplar.

Not true. Sword and Board Magplars are very strong in PvP. You use class skills and guild skills instead of sword and board skills.

That's why I said sometimes. Magplar with sword and shield is popular too!

I was trying to be general in my response because I found it easier to follow a build until you get the hang of Zos's combat logic, but once you do get it, just being focused and remembering your role will help one make future decisions when one branches out and experiments with their own builds.

5pc heavy magicka user was all the rage one or two patches ago- get all the spell damage, sacrifice none of the defense. Every sorcerer and their mom was doing it in pvp. It's perfectly possible to do vet content with hybrid characters and off meta characters -- I have a magNb tank lol. I just wanted to emphasize for the op that having a role focus in mind from the start will make decisions clearer.

Ian_Stormbringer

Great info and I thank you all. Still confused though as there have been different views. Magic or Stamina, and what should my skill bars be set up with? I am siding with Stamina but the last couple of posts have me thinking as staying Mag. The one I did read that confused me was S/B but do not use any of the skills from that line. Thanks for the help.

Zordrage

i tried this.... OP it wont gonna work ealry level is super good after lvl20 you notice some serious Dmg decreases to the level that would be better to just go pure tank....

most of your magica abilities are useless if you go Stam most of your weapon abilities are crap if you go Mag...

both of them will be utterly crap if you try to divide... in this game thx to not having softcaps or anything the classes that put everything into 1 stat and usese mostly Magic or stam abilities are the king.... and devs sadly balance around that....

Vajrak

Templar Paladin: A holy warrior, smiting enemies with the power of the gods, and restoring self and allies with beneficial light. A bulwark of defense by mixing magic and heavy armor, with an ability to turn wrath back on foes.

Note: No PvP skills are being utilized here, so there is no need to farm Cyrodil, but 600CP is being utilized

Race: Redguard -- no stamina=no blocks, no provokes. Redguard gets a nice little racial that lets you get some stam back when attacking, while also giving a larger pool to call on. Very helpful.

Mundus: The Atronach -- Recovery is your friend. No magicka=no spells. no spells=your survival and ability to support takes a pretty big hit.

Attributes: Health - 16 Magicka- 40 Stamina - 8

Food: Longfin Pasty with Melon Sauce -- Tristat food, because you'll be making use of all 3.

Gear:
Kagrenac's Hopex5 (Crafted,Heavy, Sturdy)
Arch-Mage x5 (Jewelry w/ Shielding Enchantment, Gloves/Sash Sturdy)
Night's Silencex2 (Crafted,Defending Weapon/Sturdy Shield)

Why Kagrenac's Hope?
Sometimes a fight goes wrong. A mechanic catches someone who couldn't get up. The party wipes and only the tank is left standing. Kagrenac's Hope, combined with the Templar passive Restoring Light: Master Ritualist, gives you a HUGE boost to rezzing -- 3.5s resurrect time (instead of 7s), and for that time because of the way CP is distributed you'll take 15% less damage.

Why Arch-Mage?
You're going to heavy attack to restore stamina, and with good usage of your damage shield, that shouldn't be a problem. Since you're already using a heavy attack, why not double tap it and gain some magicka back as well? The extra spell damage and recovery are just a nice little bonus.

Night's Silence? Such a noob!
It seems like it, I mean why not just use a monster set, right? And you can, by all means. But until you find a set that you like, feel free to pump this on, and get an extra bump to your stamina. While stamina costs on this build aren't massive, it never hurts to have a little extra, just in case. If you do decide to move to monster sets, there are a few good options, or you can just snag any 2-piece set bonus that you find fits your style.

Monster Set suggestions:
Valkyn Skoria -- HP, and Structured Entropy actually can trigger this.

Swarm Mother -- that little touch of Stam recovery, and a nice way to drag archers and mages to you at the cost of something you are doing anyway: Blocking

Spawn of Mephala -- HP again, and a nice little 1k dps increase plus a slow field for heavy attacking. Since you'll be heavy attacking to gain resources anyway, throwing in an extra effect with it isn't a bad idea.

Scourge Harvester -- a nice little health steal for getting smacked in the gob. Since you specialize at getting smacked in the gob, this'll let you keep it up longer.

Just remember -- Monster sets are ugly.


Skillbars: Sword/Shield both
Bar 1: Harness Magicka, Pierce Armor, Purifying Light, Radiant Aura, Structured Entropy Ult: Empowering Sweep

Bar 2: Blazing Spear (Flex), Inner Fire, Ritual of Retribution, Channeled Focus, Structured Entropy Ult: Empowering Sweep

Flex options:
Radiant Glory -- for fights where you aren't as concerned with the extra mag restore with Blazing Spear, Radiant Glory gives you a nice execute assist option. While the damage isn't as high as Radiant Destruction obviously, it is still respectable, and heals you at the same time. Keep up your taunt rotation with pierce/inner fire, and you can help with the execute, not just meat shield it (depending on the fight, of course).

Explosive Charge -- a very useful gap closer for those fights where you need to be mobile and interrupt (CoS comes to mind). It can also trigger the extra damage from Aedric Spear: Burning Light, or be used as an initial hate grabber (although triggering Radiant Aura does this better on a much larger area)

Dark Flare -- a little healing reduction, a decent chunk of damage -- a reasonable option to slot in when you have a fight that works better at range (Engine Guardian, a certain dungeon version 2 with lots of shells and shadows). While it's cost is a little high (nearly 3k) it's cast time plus your boosted mag restore will let you keep pumping it out for a long time since basically every 2nd cast is free.

Hasty Prayer -- the "healadin" option. You can actually switch this onto your main bar, and drop radiant aura on to the backbar instead. The heal on it is not only higher than on Breath of Life/Honor the Dead , but the AoE it hits is nearly the same size as Ritual of Retribution, and if you heal an ally below 60% hp they get extra ultimate.

Blood Altar -- this one really does look troll, and would only really be used on longer fights/bosses. but an extra touch of heal (700ish hps) to everyone for putting out damage -- and that heal will trigger with Ritual of Retributions damage, as well as Structured Entropy's.

Honor the Dead -- Yes, Honor the Dead, not breath of life. If you are using this heal, you are using it as an emergency heal, not as a spammable (if you are spamming heals, use Hasty Prayer instead). Honor the Dead has a nice effect for that emergency situation in that if you are using it on someone below 75% it'll refund 60% of it's cost. This makes it the most magicka efficient single target heal available to you. Even if you have to Aim it a little.

Endgame 600CP Stats/Relevance:

HP: 31k Mag: 25k Stam: 18k
Recovery: Mag - 1206, Stam - 560 (Don't worry, will explain why this works out just fine)

Spell damage (full boosted with wrath and major + minor sorcery) - 2351

Resistance: Physical 26.6k, Spell 29.6k

CP Allocation:
Red
100 Bastion, 50 Hardy, 50 Elemental Defender
Blue
100 Master-at-Arms, 100 Blessed
Green
100 Shadow Ward
100 Blessed (again, will explain this below)

IMPORTANT RACIALS AND COSTS:
Redguard Adrenaline Rush: Restores 792 Stamina with a melee attack(5s cd)
Block/Bash Cost: Block - 105, Bash - 586 (You gain stamina when you bash!)
Arch-mage 5 piece bonus: Heavy attack restores 834 magicka (along with the stamina)
Heavy Attack Stam restore: 2.5k

Attack benefits/bonuses:
Purifying Light -- 15.4k copied damage, minor sorcery to party for 20 seconds, 2.6k heal/2s (1.3khps once it's triggered)
Ritual of Retribution -- 1k damage/2s (500dps), 1.3k heal/2s (650hps)
Blazing Spear -- 750dps
Structured Entropy -- 363dps(5235/14.4s), 575hps(self only, 2 procs, on cast and @6s for 1.7khp)
Radiant Aura -- AoE magsteal -- blazing spear and ritual of retribution will make sure you keep this streaming in steadily on top of your mag recovery (300s, equivalent to 600 recovery)
Channeled Focus (major ward/resolve + 120 mag every 0.5s, equivalent to 480 mag recovery)

Boosted mag recovery (with Radiant Aura+blazing spear+channeled focus):
1206+600+480=2286 Magicka Recovery, in addition to the extra restore on heavy attacks (834/2s animation)

Why Empowering Sweep?

The damage reduction from it ramps up based on how many enemies you hit, it's cost is very low as well -- between outgoing heals and constant DoTs, you'll be filling up your ult bar fast enough to use it often. Added bonus: The damage reduction stacks with your shield from Magicka Harness.

Why Magicka Harness?

It has a higher base rating than Dampen Magic, with the added benefit of restoring even more magicka if you are taking spell damage. 4.2k cost for a 6s shield, with nearly 2.3k mag restored every 2s makes it pretty easy to keep up unless you are just spamming it without a care to resources. Good cycling with this can prevent you from taking a lot of damage.

While your heals on this setup aren't ideal, it is a nice little bit extra along with whatever the healer is actually putting out (an extra 2k heal per second essentially, that gets boosted the lower hp someone is because of the passive on Restoring Light: Mending).

This isn't the only feasible way to play a Paladin obviously, but it has what you are looking for: Long resilience, strong tank and hate management with stam and mag both utilized, a little bit of pop-and-drop damage, and a lot of small constant heals, with burst heal options.

hmsdragonfly

Ian_Stormbringer wrote: »

Great info and I thank you all. Still confused though as there have been different views. Magic or Stamina, and what should my skill bars be set up with? I am siding with Stamina but the last couple of posts have me thinking as staying Mag. The one I did read that confused me was S/B but do not use any of the skills from that line. Thanks for the help.

As in, equip Sword and Board but you don't use any skills from the skill line.

Example, a PvP setup:
Front bar (S&B): Aurora Javelin - Toppling Charge - Puncturing Sweep - Radiant Oppresion - Radiant Aura | U: Shooting Star
Back bar (S&B): Entropy - Channeled Focus - Reflective Light - Ritual of Retribution - Breath of Life |U: Empowering Sweep

hmsdragonfly

Vajrak wrote: »

Skillbars: Sword/Shield both
Bar 1: Harness Magicka, Pierce Armor, Purifying Light, Radiant Aura, Structured Entropy Ult: Empowering Sweep

Bar 2: Blazing Spear (Flex), Inner Fire, Ritual of Retribution, Channeled Focus, Structured Entropy Ult: Empowering Sweep

What about Heroic Slash and Absorb Magic :O
What about BoL :O

Jusey1

My Templar is a 2-Handed Sword Paladin actually. Made him built for tanking primarily and dps second. Using his shining light to guide his group into the darkness of the dungeons of Tamriel... Though I only use a healing ability when I solo public stuff. That self-heal is quite good. Otherwise, I recommend primarily using the Spear Skill you get from being a Templar. Sun Shield, DPS Spear, and Knockback Spear are the best ones to use. Use this with Inner Fire from Undaunted and you should do well as a tank.

Biro123

Search some stamplar and magplar builds on youtube - you'll get a feel for the difference between them.

But generally magica builds use their main class abilities and/or resto/destro staves for dealing damage and healing. Stamina builds use a mix of the other weapon abilities and a few 'stamina morphs' of class abilities (where present) to deal damage/heal.

Aside from that a stam use will often use some magica class utility and buff abilities (like the Templars purge for example) - the kind of thing which doesn't scale with the amount of magica/spell-damage you have.

Magica builds will often still have to rely on some stam for blocking/dodging/breakfree alongside their magica abilities. 1-h and shield is simply the most efficient weapon for blocking - so often people use it on a defensive bar, even if not really using any abilities from it.

It all kind of depends what you need from where to make up a complete build.

ArchMikem

Wearing all Heavy will take your possible weapon damage away, however if you want to hurt things with Sword & Shield, use Tremorscale for a Monster Set. That 7k damage procs 50% of the time every time you use Puncture/Ransack. My StamDK uses a fun little Sword & Shield damage build with that proc set.